My Social Media Should Appear Legit!

photo: unsplash.com

Isn't online comparison such a temptation these days?

With social media, it has become so easy for us to find ourselves comparing our lives with other people's.

I am quite sure that somehow, we all have that one person or group of people whose social media updates we wouldn't ever want to miss checking out whenever we get online.

"Man, this guy's/girl's posts are always lit!" We silently exclaim, rather ecstatically, every time we visit those people’s social media timelines.

If, for example, someone derives great pleasure in scrolling through social media posts of how his/her friend somewhere is seeming to have a lot of good times, I would arguably say that this isn’t bad at all; the only challenge is that it gives the temptation of comparison such a big chance.

Is it really fair anyway, for us to compare our real life with the highlights of other people’s? I believe, arguably though, that most of us only post the highlights of our lives most of the time. We usually prefer to post the best pictures of the best moments for the rest of the world to see. Little do we know that even those people with really amazing lives also have untweetable moments which they never get to post.

It is also mathematically unfair to compare 1,440 minutes of your day to 1 minute or so that it took that classy babe/dude to take that photo that you’re fantasizing about. The ratio is absolutely crazy: 1440:1! How sure can we be that they didn't break down into tears after walking away from the cameras and the lights?

Seeing someone posting their nice photos while in the UK, Dubai or in some white sand-beaches somewhere doesn't at any point mean that that person is doing okay. They might have slept hungry that day/night since they only went to Dubai for a work trip that only catered for transport and accommodation.

This reminds me of a period when I went through depression. Yes, I did. This was the period in my life where I had the most amazing time on social media ever. My WhatsApp statuses were the brightest: fancy foods, beautiful swimming pools, nice hotels, stylish photographs, cool friends, yet I wasn't fine internally.

I would go with my friends everywhere and anywhere because I always kept thinking, “Well, if I go swimming, maybe I will feel better”, or “If I go here or there with so-and-so, perhaps I will feel much better.” But nope, I never felt better. 

The saddest part was that even my closest friends always thought I was okay, “I mean, these fancy pictures say it all!” They thought. But very few of them ever managed to check in to see how or who I really was. After all, a four-second smile is not hard to fake for the camera, is it?

Now, please quote me right: by no means am I saying that all people with very nice or fancy social media outlooks are in reality sad and miserable. I am saying that fancy, nice-looking social media outlook doesn't necessarily infer that those people are doing okay or better than you.

Looking at the photos that someone carefully chooses and puts about 10 Instagram filters onto each of them, shouldn't make us think that they are better and we are less, and neither should it drive us into some dumb decisions of posting things/pictures anyhow, just for the sake of wanting to also get to use some trending hashtags like #relationshipgoals #Dubai #Vacation #BossyLady #MissMoney #MrMoney #HateYourbrokegame, among others.

I also mean not to say that there are no people with actually very amazing lives; they are very many out there, with less hustle, no fuss, they are real are blessed, and that is very okay. The challenge is our likely comparison of ourselves with them.

God has blessed you with an amazing life, just in a different sphere. Maybe God has blessed them with trips around the world and He has blessed you with an amazing family that loves and supports you. So, you comparing yourself with your social media friends is not fair. Some people can end up so deceived by social media comparison that they unreasonably move in with a guy/woman who promises them the world tours they see others having, and in the long run, they find themselves breaking the hearts of the family that truly loved and appreciated them, as a result of unyielded fantasies and expectations. That wouldn’t be fair to either person eventually.

No matter how glamorous your friends’ social media might seem to be, please check on them. Yes, they may be growing, achieving here and there, but how are they really doing? How was their night? How are they?

Yes, they might be in Paris or Dubai or somewhere in the States, but how are they? How is the environment treating them? How are they fitting in? etc.

Having an amazing social media outlook is not bad at all, but why you are trying to make it more amazing matters and how you are doing that still matters too. We don't need to lose our values, the Christ in us and our integrity just to have more social media likes and followers, otherwise it’d be like selling a birthright in exchange for a bowl of soup!

Lots of Love!

God Bless you For Me!